MI7®

As some of you may already know, I'm not a big fan of copy protected software. I generally do not buy software with copy protection if I can find any reasonable substitute without. (Sonalksis, FabFilter, OhmForce and AudioDamage being examples of companies creating top notch plugins without copy protection for example. I'm a paying customer of all four.) Since I was unable to get Pace/iLok working well on my system even with quite a bit of support, I do not, ever, buy pace protected software. I also generally prefer challenge/response to dongles. All in all however, I MUCH prefer software without these things at all. Why? Well, the way I see it, all they do is make life hard for the paying customer. Most of the protected software is available in cracked form anyway.

Please note that this doesn't mean that I do support the use of illegal software in any way. If you use it, pay for it. However, this is a recommendation to vote with your wallet. If a company doesn't trust you enough to sell you software without some means to control that you use it “properly”, or with some means to control or limit how you use the software you paid to be able to use, simply refuse to buy their product. Kindly email them and tell them that you choose (and pay for) a competitors product based on the fact that they don't use any copy protection.

The music software industry still seem to be pretty decent, even those companies that use copy protection, but who knows what will happen when the “war” escalades. Right now, most companies allow you to sell or trade licenses, have nice upgrade deals, crossgrade deals and you name it. (And really nice companies, like AudioDamage, allow you to return the software if you don't like it for a full refund). In other parts of the software industry, things aren't quite as nice, and I feel that at least Waves is on their way to the dark side...

What got me started this time was the article:

http://studionebula.com/blog/2007/12/02/why-i-boycott-products-that-use-paceilok-and-why-you-should-too

combined with a proper horror story about software and policies in a slightly different field, namely CAD.

I work as a software designer for a company that designs and builds industrial machine systems. However, since I'm the guy around who know the most about computers, I tend to do my fair share of computer support as well.

So, well, server upgrade time. We decided to switch from per seat licenses to server based floating licenses for our SolidWorks CAD system. To switch from per seat licenses to floating licenses is expensive, like 1000 euro per license expensive, unless you own at least five licenses, then it's free. Luckily, we do.

Or so we thought.

You see, one of the licenses was bought in the beginning, before we became the company we are today. So, the first license wasn't bought by this company, but by a small company owned by one of the employees that acted as the current company's front until business was up and running. It was bought for the current company's use only, and with the current company's money. License transfer time!

Or so we thought.

Turns out, after long and hard discussions with SolidWorks, that their license policy doesn't allow licenese transfers. At all. If your company is bought by another company

that company MIGHT be able to take over your licenses, if they ask really nicely, and if SolidWorks is in a nice mood, and decide it should be allowed. Anyway, for us, it was a blank no. You cant transfer the license, can't sell it, can't do anything with it. Also, unless you have a support agreement that you pay annually, you aren't allowed upgrades, and you can't “rejoin” the support agreement, you have to buy the license again.

These licenses aren't exactly cheap. We're talking about 10000 euro+ for a license, and about 1000 euro per license and year in support. Also, for the last five or so years, my current company has paid the support fee for the license that now wasn't transferable. Talk about shitty customer support.

I REALLY REALLY hope we won't end up there with music software, so please, vote with your wallets, and vote wisely.